Getty Images Nene Leakes gives an update on her son.
Nene Leakes has spoken out about her 23-year-old son Brentt Leakes, who suffered heart failure and a stroke at the end of September 2022.
The former “Real Housewives of Atlanta” star took to her Instagram Stories on Monday, October 10, 2022, just after TMZ reported the news.
“Okay, hey guys. How are you?” Leakes said in a video that she filmed in her car. “So, obviously I’ve gotten tons of text messages, tons of emails. Everybody’s asking and concerned about Brentt and we thank you guys so much,” Nene said.
“This is not the way I wanted it to come out. We wanted to be able to talk about it ourselves when Brentt was in a better place,” she explained, adding that she chose to speak out because she wants the correct information to be available to the public.
“Two weeks ago today, Brentt had congestive heart failure and stroke. He’s only 23, so he’s really young for something like that to happen to him,” she continued. Brentt’s father is Gregg Leakes. He died in 2021 after a battle with colon cancer, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Here’s what you need to know:
Doctors Think Brentt Could Have Had Covid
Given Brentt’s young age, having heart failure and a stroke is fairly uncommon. Doctors have been doing all kinds of tests to try to figure out what might have caused this, Nene said.
“The first thing, you know, a lot of doctors think of when someone that age comes in with that kind of condition is maybe they have done drugs or maybe they have some serious infection. Maybe HIV or some sort of infection, is what I’m being told by the doctors. Brentt doesn’t drink or do drugs and obviously they’ve tested him for all of those things. They also tested him for HIV,” Nene added.
“They were thinking that maybe he had caught Covid and he didn’t know that he had Covid. The doctors were saying they did see some things like that happen if they caught the Delta variant,” Nene said.
“He never knew he had Covid. I’ve never known him to have Covid. So, they have run a number of tests on him to see what could have possibly made this happen to him. We are still trying to figure out… because if we knew the cause, obviously they could treat the cause,” she explained.
Later on in her posts, Nene said that doctors are wondering if Brentt may have been born with some kind of heart condition that is just coming to the surface now. For those wondering if Nene’s son’s weight may have been a factor in what happened, she stressed that doctors don’t think so.
Nene Asked for Prayers for Her Son
Although Brentt’s heart failure and stroke happened two weeks ago, Nene stressed how new this was and how difficult it has been for the family.
“It was very scary. I don’t even want to go into details of what happened and how I found out and what condition he was in. Obviously a stroke is a very serious thing and so he’s struggling with speaking and it’s, I don’t know,” she said.
“Keep us in your prayers. Keep Brentt in your prayers,” she added.
“Brentt FaceTimed me this morning. He’s in good spirits. We are just shocked,” she said. Nene said her son has shown “some improvement” which they are thankful for.
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